She makes me laugh
by Smiley612
Summary: Everyone knows Neil as the uptight, unkind, and rude Animal Dealer in Echo Village who needed to lighten up. Rio was ultimately the person who did that to him; she made Neil laugh for the first time in years. [Neil/Rio; oneshot]


"What do you want?" Neil grunted, facing Emma as he lifted his head out of his hands.

"Well, aren't you Mr. Sunshine today?" Emma commented, folding her arms across her chest. "I wanted a jar of milk, because I've been walking around all day and I'm kind of tired—"

"Yeah, yeah," Neil waved her off, crouching to grab a jug. "I don't really care why you want it." He told Emma the price, and she gave him the money without protest.

"Well, thank you for the cow juice!" she joked. When Neil didn't crack a smile, Emma rolled her eyes.

Neil cleared his throat angrily before asking, "What's the matter with _you_?"

Emma started to walk away, but before she could climb down the slope, she turned around and told Neil, "Seriously, lighten up. You need to laugh at things sometimes. The world isn't as bad as you think it is."

**v v v**

It wasn't long after that when the farmer moved in.

Neil wasn't in town for the first few days she was there. Word was she tripped right over her feet and tumbled all the way down the mountain in her first week — Neil would've loved to see that.

"But I don't _want_ to!" he complained to Dunhill once he re-arrived in Echo Village on the 9th of Spring. "I'd rather not give up a precious cow to _her_!"

Dunhill tilted his head, like he knew something about Neil that Neil himself didn't know. "Well, son, I'm asking you to. You have a million and one cows; why don't you just suck it up and give her your youngest cow or something?"

He groaned, running up to the slope to his shop, shaking his head. After a minute of pondering and reluctance (and eight other scowls from Dunhill for taking so long), Neil took a cow out of his pen and led it to the newly-renovated farm.

"I can't believe I have to do this," he muttered to himself as he approached the house. "Giving up a precious cow that could be used for milk and butter and cheese . . . and company . . . I liked this cow . . . even though I never gave it a name . . . I'll give it a name right now!"

Neil didn't realize when the front door of the farmer's house opened and closed. "Bessie!" he muttered to himself, smiling.

"Sorry," he heard a voice say, making Neil jump out of his thoughts. "But I don't want to name my cow Bessie. It's too sterotypical."

Groaning, he lifted his head out of his hands to see a young woman with waist-long blonde hair tied up in a ponytail. "Oh, it's you," he sneered at her. "You're the new farmer? I would've thought you'd be more . . ."

"Be more what?" she questioned, putting her hands on her hips, waiting for an answer.

Neil had only known this girl for two seconds and she was already testing him. "Um . . . I don't know. Stronger, I guess. You look like you couldn't swing your hoe more than ten times before you tire out."

When she widened her eyes, Neil knew she was going to say something against his statement, so to avoid having to listen to her rant and complain, he announced, "Just name the damn cow and we'll move on with our lives."

She relaxed her stiff body; her eyes, the size of tennis balls, shrunk down to their original size. Neil couldn't help but wonder what color her eyes were; if he looked straight into them, they were an obvious blue, but from another angle, they looked like a puke-green. The farmer broke Neil out of thoughts once again by saying, "Malfoy."

"What?" he asked quickly, regaining his composer on the dirt.

"Malfoy," she repeated, smiling, going up to pet her new cow. "You know, like the character in _Harry Potter_?"

"Yeah, I know about the character," he sneered, looking from the cow to the farmer. He couldn't understand why someone would let their hair grow out that long. "Why do you want to name a cow _Malfoy_?"

"Because," she stated, looking Neil in the eye for the first time, and he still couldn't see what color her eyes were. One second they looked like a cement-blue, and other second they seemed a puke-green. "This cow has blonde hair, and Malfoy has blonde hair. Maybe he'll even work for He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named!" she teased, laughing, as she played with the cow's blonde tuft of hair. "I grew up with Harry Potter, right? Anyone who didn't didn't have a childhood...I feel bad for those people. I loved reading; but I also loved drawing and running and other things, too...I don't remember much about my childhood, but my oldest sibling is 15 years older than me, so he'd probably remember since he was 15 when I was born —" Neil forced himself to not interrupt this girl while she was talking; and _Goddess_, could she talk.

Neil forced himself not to scowl. He wanted to tell her that she didn't live in Hogwarts; it was the real world and Draco Malfoy only existed in books. He blinked. "Okay," he whispered, "well, I'll leave you two alone to . . . bond, I guess. Alright, bye."

As he left one of his precious cows alone with the farmer, he started to walk out of her farm when he realized he didn't even know her name. When he yelled his question back to her, she replied with, "RIO!" She ran to the barn, her blonde ponytail bouncing behind her.

"What a strange name . . ." he muttered to himself, finally forcing himself to leave his cow behind. "What a strange girl . . ."

**v v v**

For the first couple of weeks in spring, Neil thought it was funny to watch Rio mess up on her farm. Sometimes, he'd be sorting through goods at his shop up the slope and he'd hear a loud thump from the farm area, and he knew that Rio had tripped and fallen again. He didn't know what made her fall like that so often, but every time the thump echoed from the from, he also heard her laugh.

Time passed, like it should have, and Neil always had to glance from the corner of his eye Rio walking past Emma's house into the River area, sometimes carrying a tool with her. The warm air became so hot it could make the devil sweat, until Autumn finally came around.

"What are you doing here?" he asked, broken up out of a slumber on a Monday morning. He had forgotten he was supposed to work the previous day so he had stayed up late; then Dunhill had woken him up.

"I'm here to buy a chicken!" Rio announced, her grin stretching from ear to ear, her usual ponytail hanging behind her.

"A chicken, finally?" Neil asked, moving over to the pen. "Well, it's about time. You've been here since Spring; it's almost Winter now and you haven't bought a single animal from me."

"I know!" she cheered, as if having only one animal was something to celebrate. "I'm more of a crop farmer, I guess. Dunhill's been sticking me with these stupid 'Town Renovation' plans, ugh . . . they take up like half my day . . . the other day I forgot to feed Malfoy — you know, my cow —"

"Yes, I know who your cow is," he sneered, remembering when she had stupidly named her cow after a book character.

"Well, I forgot to feed Malfoy, so when I went out to forage for some money, I came back to find Malfoy let himself out! He ate half of my crops!" Rio laughed, holding her chest. Neil watched in amazement; how could she find something like that funny? Sure, Neil was an animal dealer, not a farmer, but he'd give the stupid cow away if it ate half of his crops.

She continued to laugh until Neil cleared his throat. Rio's puke-green/concrete-blue eyes (Neil thought that Rio had the most disgustingly colored eyes, whatever color they actually were) widened, and she asked what was wrong; Neil answered with: "Well, you were here to order a chicken, and here it is. Please pick a name so we can get this over with.

The echo of her laugh still etched on her face, Rio thought for a moment. Growing impatient, Neil was about to pound his fist on the counter when Rio snapped her fingers. "Oh, I know! Marta!"

"Marta?" Neil asked, writing the name on the piece of paper. When Rio nodded, he questioned, "Why _Marta_? Don't you mean _Martha_? With an '_H_'?"

"Oh, no!" she told him, taking the chicken out of Neil's arms and began to walk down the slope. Before she was out of sight, however, she yelled up to him, "My father had a chicken named Marta when I was a kid, but he forgot to put the H when he was writing the name down."

Even though Neil was still confused about her story, he heard Rio talking to the chicken on the way back to her farm: "Yes, that's right, Marta! You're going to help me with these Town Renovation plans, aren't you? Like, seriously, Dunhill . . . couldn't you get someone who _isn't_ a farmer and who _doesn't_ have to take care of her crops and animals . . . like seriously? I'm already swamped with crops, Goddess . . . and now I have a second animal . . . this is going to be so hard! I wish I was more like Pete . . . he was always more advanced on the field than I was . . . then again, he was 15 years older than me . . . but now that I have a chicken, I have to buy feed, and —"

After hearing that, Neil officially ruled Rio as the strangest person he had ever met. He felt like he would laugh himself when he saw that Rio had tripped over her own feet on the way back to her farm and the chicken ran out of her arms, tugging on her ponytail with its beak; but as Neil shook his head in embarrassment, he saw that Rio was laughing again on the way back.

She may have been the strangest person already, but Neil couldn't understand why she thought hurting herself was so funny.

**v v v**

A few weeks after she ordered the chicken with the weird name, people starting moving back to Echo Village. A hairstylist named Allen, a mailwoman named Tina, and others that Rio thought were so interesting and exciting. After Tina moved in, Neil saw Rio walk into her house and didn't see her leave until before she had to go home and go to sleep.

It might have been Spring of her second year when Tina and Rio walked up the slope to Neil's stand.

"What do you want?" he complained, having to pay attention to his costumers for once.

Rio's cement-blue/puke-green eyes looked to Tina for an answer. "Well," she started, grinning at her friend, "We're here to buy Animal Treats."

"Tina?" I questioned, and she nodded. "You're not a farmer. I can understand why Rio would want some, but why do you want them?" After seeing Rio's guilty expression, Neil's shoulders sagged and his curious look turned into a _Really_?

"Well . . ." she muttered, playing with her fingers, her blonde bangs falling in front of her odd eyes, "Tina and I were having lunch together on my farm the other day, when I accidentally put a Cow Treat on her plate. Not knowing it was there, Tina ate it, and, now . . . she says she's addicted."

"Oh, no," Neil groaned.

"Yup!" Tina grinned. "I'm addicted to Cow Treats now, and it's all thanks to _you_, Neil! _Now give me that Cow Treat_!"

Rolling his eyes, Neil grabbed the Cow Treats from under the counter and handed a few to Tina. She payed for them and started to sprint down the slope to her house; Rio was about to follow, but Neil whistled to catch her attention.

"What's wrong?" she asked, turning to face him.

"Oh, nothing," he muttered, still trying to decipher what color her eyes were. The simpler way would have been just to ask her, but Neil wouldn't take the easier way out. "Anyway, I can see why you're friends with Tina; you're both very _weird_."

"We're both very _happy_," Rio said, in a tone she was using for the first time since Neil had known her in a year. Usually, Rio was all happy-go-lucky, but now she seemed like Emma when there was nothing to ship (which actually happened very often, with Rio being the main profit of the town) "The world isn't as bad as you think, Neil. It's full of wonderful things if you'd just open your eyes. You don't have to take _everything_ seriously. Laugh at things sometimes."

Neil didn't know at the time that Rio's simple statement would change his life. "Well," he said, ready to dismiss her, "How about you—" Before he could finish his statement, however, his stomach growled.

"Ooh!" Rio cheered; her old self made an appearance, and Neil found himself happier than he was just a second before. "Stay right there, Neil. I have something for you!"

"It's not like I actually _can_," he muttered to himself, but in just a measly two minutes, Rio ran to her farm and back, carrying a jug of milk with her.

"Here!" she smiled, handing him the milk.

"I . . ." Neil said, completely speechless; Rio could obviously see that, because her grin stretched even further. "I can't take this. You only have one cow. You're supposed to ship this milk to make money."

"Oh, nonsense!" she said. "This may be my second year in the village, and I may still _only_ have one cow, but Malfoy gives milk every single day. I can cow one day without shipping a milk — and hopefully Emma doesn't flip shit about how I didn't ship milk today, Goddess . . . that woman needs help . . . I swear, she came from an alien planet because she has like OCD. She's obsessed with shipping things. It's all she talks about, day and night. She came into my house at 6 in the morning in my first week here to tell me how to ship things! Like, Emma, I love you, but I grew up with a farm with my parents. I knew how to ride a tractor before I could ride a bike. You don't need to tell me how to ship, you know? I mean, Neil, you're an Animal Dealer so you don't deal with crops while I'm more of a crop farmer than an animal—"

"Well, thank you, Rio," he said, smiling slightly, partly just to shut her up. Rio, seeing this, pointed at him, her cement-blue/puke-green eyes shining brightly in the dim light of the Spring evening.

"I saw that!" she laughed, running down the slope to catch up with Tina. "I saw you smile! That's the first time I saw you smile in a year! YEAH!" she punched and kicked the air before running into Tina's house.

Not even bothering to hide his smile, Neil officially ruled Rio as his friend that day.

**v v v**

_Just walk in there. She won't care. She moved in forever and a half ago. This is her second Autumn here. JUST WALK IN THERE, NEIL! GO!_

Finally losing to himself in his inner war, Neil took a deep breath and opened the door; the first thing he did was screech.

"OH MY GOD!" he said, backing up and accidentally hitting the wall behind him.

She turned around quickly, holding a baseball bat (Where she got that from, Neil would never know). "WHAT?" she screamed in response. "What's wrong? Is there someone here?"

Neil ran up to her and took the baseball bat out of her hands. "No, nothing," he said, holding back a laugh. "It's . . . it's just . . . wow . . . that is different . . ."

"What's different?" she asked. "The calender? Oh, yeah, I know! Can you believe it's already Autumn? Feels like it was summer yesterday . . ."

"Um, Rio?" he interrupted her, and Rio smiled at him to acknowledge that she knew he was talking. "Yeah? It's Fall 1st. It was summer yesterday."

"Yeah, well, whatever. Anyway, what's different? I _did_ do a bit of redecorating . . . the bed is now in the corner over there, the storage is near the kitchen because I just realized that I couldn't move the counters — the wardrobe is by the bed; the calender's now near the bed so I know what day it is, isn't that clever? Now I never have to wake up and think about what day it is, I can just sit up and see —"

"Rio, sweetie, it's not about the redecorating. You redecorated back in summer." he told her, and Rio said, "Oh." Laughing, he took her shoulders and told her, very slowly, "It's your hair. I just walked in here and . . . oh, Goddess, I still can't —"

Rio was silent, her weirdly colored eyes staring at him. They looked cement-blue today, but yesterday the were the color of puke again. "What about my hair?"

"It — it just — I am so not used to seeing it down . . ."

"OH!" she announced, slapping her knee and laughing. "You're acting like that because you're not used to seeing my hair down? Wow, I thought it was something bad, because you didn't like how it was styled today or something . . ."

"No, I . . . wow . . ." Neil said, still speechless. It seemed like Rio's constant talking had made Neil become the opposite of what Rio was. "WOW . . . it's down . . ."

"Neil," Rio laughed, sitting down, "I always take it down before I go to bed. It's down every day. You just don't see it."

"One thing I can see is why you put it up in a ponytail . . ." he muttered, taking a strand of her blonde hair and running it through his fingers. "Damn, Rio, this hair reaches down to your waist? Why have you never gotten it cut?"

"I don't know!" she told him, turning her body around so she was lying down on her bed. "I haven't gotten it cut, in, like, at least —"

"Eight years," Neil answered for her.

"Yeah," she agreed, nodding, but Rio wasn't done talking, like always. "It's strange. My mother used to get my hair cut all the time when I was little, before my father died . . . hmm, I wonder if his death was why she stopped cutting my hair? Maybe he died at the hand of a hair stylist or something, because after he died, we were left with all his chickens — and one was named Marta! — and everything else that he owned, so maybe a hair stylist was cutting his hair, wasn't looking, and cut into his skull by accident and he bled to death or something! Wow, that would explain so much . . . was that why we got rid of all the scissors and combs in the house after his death? Well, anyway, his chicken, Marta —"

"Okay, Rio, that is enough," Neil stopped her, before she could get in further. Neil knew how much Rio could talk, especially with him, but Neil was still speechless at her blonde hair, sitting on her back. "You have to get it cut," he finalized, looking at her.

"Get it what?" she asked incredulously, and Neil repeated what he said. "No, no, no, no, no. I am not getting it cut. I haven't gotten it cut in eight years and I'm not starting now."

"Why?!" Neil questioned, but before Rio could answer, he interrupted. "You know what, never mind. I'll tranquilize you if I have to, but we're getting your hair cut today." Rio protested all the way to Allen's shop, but once he had closed the door and told Allen what she wanted, Neil thought it was safe to leave them alone.

A few hours later, after wondering why it would take that long to cut hair, Rio came out of the salon.

"Well, it's about time!" Neil groaned, pushing himself off the bench in front of the shop. "Now, let's see how short your new hair actually is. Maybe you won't have to keep putting it up in a ponytail and I can finally decipher what color your eyes — Goddess, what happened?"

Instead of seeing short hair, Neil looked up to see Rio with the same length as before; but instead of blonde hair, she now had orange hair.

"Why did you dye your hair?" he questioned, walking her home. "I thought you were getting it cut?"

Rio always seemed to surprise him in the best way possible. There was nothing to smile about, but the fact that Rio respected herself enough to make her own decisions made Neil weirdly happy. For most of his life, he had bossed people around and acted cruel and mean to them, even though he secretly just wanted a friend of his own.

When Tina had moved in in Rio's first winter, they had bonded so quickly that Neil was tempted to walk to Allen's salon and become friends with him, which wouldn't happen if he hadn't been so jealous.

"Well, I was _going_ to," she admitted, breaking Neil out of his thoughts, standing in front of her door after Neil had walked her home. The sun was setting in the distance; in the fading light, Neil still couldn't see what color her eyes were, though now they were puke-green. "But then I realized that I didn't want to cut it. I like my hair the way it is, and even though you're my friend, Neil, you can't make my decisions for me. Okay, goodnight!" she waved to him, a small grin on her face, before she shut the door in _Neil's_ face.

He rolled his eyes. Before he left Rio's farm, he said hello to Malfoy, the cow he had to give up to her over a year ago, and he went back to his house.

Neil didn't know what it was about her; could it be the mystery over her eye color? Could it be the way she laughed at everything? Could it be the way she respected herself and her decisions? Neil had no idea, but he definitely knew he had feelings for Rio that were stronger than friends.

For the next couple of hours, he realized he couldn't fall asleep. Neil tossed and turned, took his shirt off, his pants off (but after a fire in his house a few years previous, Neil learned to sleep with underpants on so no one would see him naked if he ever had to leave his home immediately), but nothing worked. It was the first day of Autumn, so the summer heat could have still been in the air; or it might have been that he hadn't fluffed his pillows in ages; or it might have been that he was in love with the farmer —

He couldn't continue his thought, because after he heard a noise outside of his house, he quickly rushed into a shirt and pants. Only a few hours before, he had seen Rio grab a baseball bat when Neil had screamed about her hair; but since Neil didn't own a baseball bat, he was forced to go out into the town, completely uncrowded in the middle of the night, only to see a jumping figure on the slope.

Blinking the sleep out of his eyes, Neil finally defined the figure as a girl; he classified the girl as Rio when he saw a ponytail bouncing behind her.

"Rio?" he questioned, walking up to her on the slope. "It's three in the morning. Why are you up . . . and why are you jumping?"

"Oh, no reason!" she cheered, jumping in front of Neil. "I just couldn't sleep! So I went around town when I fell on a rock again — I know, classy, right? — so to avoid tripping over my feet for the gazilionth time, I'm jumping around and waiting for the sun to rise to I can go forage again!"

"Hippity hop, hippity hop," Neil heard Rio mutter as she jumped around in a circle. Neil knew she was weird — Rio was the strangest person he had ever met, after all — but now she was acting especially strange.

Rio's weird eyes narrowed when Neil didn't saw anything else. "What's wrong?" she asked, suddenly forcing her feet to stay on the ground. "Usually, you'd yell at me and scream at me to go back to bed. Why aren't you saying anything?"

"Oh, nothing," he told her, finally realizing how much she had rubbed off on him. "I was just thinking about how you dyed your hair orange today. Tigger is orange and he jumps all around . . . you're Tigger now . . ."

Rio smiled the widest she had since she came here when she saw how cute Neil was when he giggled and blushed. She had known she had feelings for Neil ever since her first Summer, but now she was thinking about how much she loved him — and judging by how fiercely Neil was blushing, she was sure he realized the same thing.

**v v v**

Neil was walking around her farm one day, milling over how much he missed "Malfoy", when Rio came out of her house, holding a basket.

"What's that?" he asked her as she walked to the river.

"Laundry," she stated simply, not bothering to look at Neil. As she walked, Neil could see the sweat on her forehead; it was the middle of summer, the hottest time of the year. Neil knew how hot it was; he even took a day off of work the other day because it was so hot. He couldn't stand to be sitting in that heat for hours upon hours.

"Laundry?" he asked, trailing behind her. "I didn't know you had laundry. Where do you do it?"

"In the river," she said, a small smile creeping up on her face. It was weird; Neil almost couldn't recognize her unless she was smiling.

"But you're just one person," he said finally, voicing his thoughts, as they arrived at the river bed. Rio sat down next to her basket and Neil followed her actions. "How could you produce that much laundry?"

"I don't," she said, not bothering to look at Neil again. Her orange ponytail, now always up, was hanging on the side of her face, so Neil had absolutely no idea what color her eyes were today.

"But, then, why—"

"I was Dunhill, Hana, and Emma's clothes as well," she finally set the record straight, her puke-green eyes (as of today) making an appearance. "They're older than me, Neil. I'm the youngest one here, after all — wait, when is your birthday again?"

"Winter 9."

"My birthday is Summer 23," he stated. "But I think Dunhill told me that you were born a year before me, so I'm still the youngest one here!" she sighed exasperatedly, almost to herself. "Ugh . . . I was the youngest of my million siblings, and I'm the youngest one on the island so far. I mean, I have, like, a million siblings! There's Henry, Claire, Jill, Pete, Jack, Hansel, Chelsea, Angela, Lillian, Kasey, Mark, Gretel, Kevin, Philip, Molly, and I mean most of them are half-siblings and step-siblings since both parents divorced and got re-married; I mean, I think my dad got re-married three times! Including me, I have over 16 brothers and sisters. Can you _believe_ that? I bet most people here in Echo Town wouldn't be able to deal with all those siblings, especially if they're the youngest. I mean, I'm still the youngest on this _island_! When will this _end_?

"Tigger?" Neil asked, calling Rio by her nickname.

"Yeah?"

"I think you're forgetting about Toni."

"Oh! Toni!" she cheered, laughing to herself as if Neil wasn't there and his voice was in her imagination. "I forgot about him! So I guess I'm not the youngest one here . . . phew!" she said, dramatically wiping sweat off her brow. "Well, that's a relief. So, why are you here today?"

"Oh, no reason," he sighed, contently watching Rio dunk clothes in the water and hang them on the branch of a tree, because she didn't have a clothesline.

"So," Rio was the one to ask the question this time. "You obviously have to wash your clothes, and since you seemed so surprised when I said I was washing them in the water, where do you wash _your_ clothes?"

"In the city," he answered, turning around to look at her farm. Rio was now in her third summer; her farm had grown so much since she first moved here. She was a stick when they first met, and now Rio was finally eating more than she usually did, so she had some meat on her now. "When I go there every day, I usually give my clothes to this attendant and when I return the next day, they're —"

"Cleaned, yeah," Rio smiled, and when Neil gave a confused look, she explained: "I'm from the city too, Neil. It's called a washing machine. I know you don't spend much time there each day, but it's called a washing machine if you didn't know."

"Oh." The two were silent after that; Rio was too involved in her task of washing the clothes, and Neil was too involved with thinking about Rio and everything else. What would happen after today? It had been almost a year since Rio had gotten her hair color changed and Neil realized that he was in love with her but nothing else had happened. There was no kiss. No requests to be boyfriend and girlfriend. Neil felt left out, like he was missing something; maybe it was his old feeling of always being lonely, like he used to be —

"Neil?" Rio asked, waving her hand in front of her face. "Hellooo? Neil? Are you in there? Neeeeiiiiil?"

"What? Oh," he sighed, facing Rio again. "Nothing, Tigger. Just thinking is all. What's up? Finished washing the clothes?"

"Yup!" she smiled, and Neil smiled when he saw her smiling. Her smile was kind of like yawning in that sense.

Neil was still caught up in his thoughts as he walked behind her. Rio told him she was going to return the clothes to Dunhill, Hana, and Emma, but Neil wasn't watching where he was going; before he knew it, instead of being behind her, Neil was now on top of Rio, her cement-blue eyes bigger than tennis balls.

He now knew why she kept tripping on her farm; there was a big rock jutting out of the ground near her fields. Neil had tripped over the rock and tumbled onto Rio, making her fall down; his arms had broken his fall, and Neil was now on top of Rio, his arms on either side of her body.

"Well," Rio said, the first thing they said in a few seconds. "I should have told you about that rock."

"Yeah," was all Neil could manage at the moment. "Um..."

"Yeah," Rio contributed. The two were silent for another few seconds, and neither thought to stand up and walk out of their awkward positions. "Aww," Rio cooed after another seconds' silence. "Neil, you're so cute when you blush."

"What?!" he exclaimed, but still too shocked to get up, off of Rio. "I'm blushing? No . . . no I'm not! It's just the summer heat! Yeah . . ."

"Oh Goddess Neil just kiss me!" Rio yelled and before Neil even knew what was happening, their lips collided and thousands of colors exploded in front of him. It was like something he had been waiting for for over 3 years had finally arrived — something he had worked for, had waited for, had anticipated for 3 whole years had been presented in front of him and it was amazing.

Their lips moved in perfect unison crushed up against each other, and it was nothing inappropriate. In his three years of knowing her, Neil knew that Tigger didn't want anything inappropriate at first, so all Neil did was kiss her, kiss her like everyone had told her he should have done for the past 3 seasons they had been dating.

When he finally came up for air, Rio's face was staring right back at her. "What?" she asked, seeing Neil's face of horror. "What? What's wrong?"

"Goddess," he muttered to himself, sitting up against the grass. "Your eyes are _brown_!

**v v v**

"So, why did you even decide to propose, anyway?" Allen asked when he had finally gotten Neil alone at his and Rio's wedding.

Grinning, Neil shrugged. "I dunno . . ." he muttered, trying not to show Allen how happy he was. "Well, she makes me laugh."


End file.
